Why Does Evil Exist?

When assessing this question it is important to distinguish that there are two sorts of evils or causes of suffering: natural evil (earthquakes, diseases, natural disasters...) and moral evil (violence, theft, murder...). Often, it seems easy to say that we human beings are responsible for moral evil and suffering that we ourselves cause. We have free will, supposedly, and could prevent these causes of suffering. God's powers may not seem very challenged by moral evil. Often, though, certain moral evils, like the holocaust or the torture and murder of a child, are examples that seem to some people to defy any claims about our making our own choices and being solely responsible for all moral evil. When so many people die unjustly under horrendous circumstances not of their own making, it is hard to see why an all powerful and benevolent god would allow an evil event of this scale to happen. Likewise, when an innocent child dies senselessly, it is difficult to see how his or her free will was involved to begin with — why would an all powerful and good God allow a child without any opportunity to become morally responsible to suffer and die senselessly?

Natural suffering is also quite difficult to reconcile with our idea of God. We might think, 'Well, if God is so good and powerful, why does he allow as much of it as he does?' When a tsunami wipes out an entire community, it may seem reasonable to wonder if this isn't over-kill on God's part. Why not simply destroy peoples' property instead of drowning everyone? Some may find the answer here to lie in our fall from the Garden of Eden; we ourselves chose to reject the original paradise we were given. The world since then is a difficult place. Yet, others find that in cases of natural evil, God seems to act randomly. Natural disasters do not seem to be caused by the evil deeds of those affected by them. The more we have learned about the world, about the causes of earthquakes, tsunamis and diseases, the less inclined we have become to blame ourselves for these occurrences. If God is a master-planner, these evils seem like flaws in his design.

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